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While the Department of Homeland Security begrudgingly admits you can fly without showing identification to screeners, trying to do so may just backfire on you, as graduate student Christopher Soghoian – who has long been interested in aviation security found out. When he tried to fly out of Washington, D.C.'s airport, his choice to take extra screening over showing identification raised the suspicion of an airport cop, who then ordered Soghoian to show his identification, checked for outstanding warrants and then handed his identification the security checkers.

Soghoian wrote to the police to clarify that the Catch-22 exists and Metropolitan Washington Airport Authority lawyer Naomi C. Klaus wrote back to say that's exactly their policy.

It is extraordinary for someone to refuse to show identification when seeking to board an airplane. The Transportation Security Administration employees at the checkpoint were concerned enough to call for police support. [...] As you many know, the threat level is still at Code Orange. Sgt. Westbrook was evaluating whether your unusual assertion should be taken at face value. Your name alone is insufficient for the quick background check that Sgt. Westbrook had run.

As for the identification law, the Supreme Court recently upheld a Nevada law that requires a person to identify himself when a police officer stops them with reasonable suspicion that a crime has or is about to be commited. During this so-calledTerry stop, a police officer may briefly detain you, pat you down for weapons, and ask you questions (which you need not answer). Maddeningly, the Supreme Court declined to answer what it means to identify oneself, refusing to say whether simply stating your name truthfully was enough.

As for being able to get through airport screening without showing identification, that rule remains secret, though a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling (.pdf) disclosed that the rule allows passengers to opt for extra-screening in lieu of showing identification, and the Transportation Security Administration website now simply recommends that passengers show identification. The signs in the airport saying you have to have identification? Lies.

That said, seems like the right to fly without identification may not be all its cracked up to be...